Braised Short Ribs with Couscous

I kid you not, these short ribs were labelled as "chicken" in the Asian grocery store. I wish I took a picture of the packaging to show you! 

I know, they look funny and are not "short ribs" in the most American sense of the word, but hey, I figured if I braise them long enough, no one would care.

Plus, you really can't go wrong with the holy trio of veggies, half a bottle of wine and 2 cans of stewed tomatoes.

(note: the wine was opened for 5 days and I was not in the mood for sangria)

After 4 hours of braising, the meat was super tender and falling off the bones.

Of course, you are more than welcome to use normal looking ribs. I'm sure they will turn out just as flavorful and much more elegant than mine. 

ps- workout of the day included reptile burpees, side planks, jump lunges, knee ups, and a few sets at the thigh toning machine. I kind of just did whatever came to my mind.

Braised Short Ribs with Couscous 

Makes 3-4 servings

1 package of short ribs (about 8-9 pieces)

1/2 cup flour 

3 stalks celery, roughly chopped

2 big carrots, chopped into big chunks

1 large onion

1 cup Beef broth or water

1/2 bottle red wine

2 cans of stewed tomatoes 

4 cloves of garlic 

1 tbsp paprika

1 tsp cayenne pepper

2 bay leaves 

1 cup couscous

1. Preheat oven to 300F.

2. Drench short ribs with flour. In a large skillet, brown all sides of the short ribs. Transfer to a dutch oven or oven safe pot.

3. In the same skillet, briefly brown vegetables. Add to the short ribs.

4. Deglaze the skillet with beef broth or water. Scrape all the bottom bits and pour all the liquid into the short ribs/ vegetables mixture. 

5. Add tomatoes, wine, paprika, cayenne and bay leaves to the pot. Make sure that all the ingredients are submerged in the tomatoes/ wine/ beef broth. 

6. Cover pot and transfer into the oven. Braise for 4 hours. Check occasionally to make sure that there is enough liquid to cover all the ingredients. Add more broth if necessary. 

7. Right before ready to serve the short ribs, prepare couscous according to packaging instructions. You will not need additional flavoring for the couscous as there will be plenty of braising liquid!